


your evil face will soon be mine (you take a woman by the neck to die)

by simplysweetperfection (tinydemons)



Category: Carmilla (Web Series)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-12
Updated: 2015-02-24
Packaged: 2018-03-12 00:55:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 10,504
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3338156
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tinydemons/pseuds/simplysweetperfection
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"I'll try," she whispers when Laura's bones have been reset and the tears have dried on her face. She blinks and Carmilla traces the curve of her cheek. "I'll try," she says again, and kisses Laura like she has been wanting for weeks.</p><p>The sword is still buried in that cavern and Carmilla is only armed with a stake and three hundred years of pain, and god, <em>god</em>, Laura kisses her because she is so very brave.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. your costumes are just a fur in diguise

**Author's Note:**

> AU in which the Dean forced Carmilla to chose between Laura and Danny - instead of Kirsch.

 

Laura's head hurts and she tastes iron on her tongue.

Carmilla says her name, fingers at her neck, and breathes relief.

 

+

 

"Carm?" she asks when Carmilla has her hands at Laura's waist and her fingers curled around Laura's hips. She's still sitting on her bed, quiet and small, even as Perry and LaFontaine march down the hallway with arms full of stakes. They are are supposed to be with them but she had grabbed Laura by the waist and pulled her to where Carmilla was sitting.

She looks up at Laura then, tired and sad. Confusion flutters against Laura's stomach. "What is it? Are you scared about getting the sword? Because we can try to find -"

"I'm sorry," she says then, a weary defeat to her voice that Laura has never heard before, and her forehead falls against Laura's chest. Laura stills, caught in the embrace.

"What?"

"You're not going to be happy."

Laura pushes her fingers through Carmilla's hair slowly, a nervous bubble crawling up her throat. She doesn't think they've ever been so close. She can hear the air rattling between Carmilla's teeth. Laura shifts and studies her dark curls. "Carm, you're starting to worry me."

But then Carmilla is pulling her down on the bed. Her arms lock around Laura and a shiver runs through her frame. Laura's fingers are still tangled in her hair, and she pushes Carmilla's bangs gently from her face and turns a little so she can see Carmilla from her position next to Laura's neck. She wonders then, when Carmilla blinks at the place where the band-aids still sit and the blood runs through Laura's veins, if she might kiss Laura or bite her. "Carmilla."

"I made a deal," she says, slowly, and swallows. Laura's fingers twitch against Carmilla's skull in response. When she tries to pull away, tries to see Carmilla's face and her sad, old eyes, Carmilla tightens around Laura further and buries her head deeper against Laura. "You can't leave."

"What?"

Carmilla doesn't murmur a response, only holds Laura close even as she squirms and tries to put some distance between the two. "What are you talking about?"

"I made a deal," she repeats. Laura's heart is hammering. This affection she gives is so foreign to her usual cold demeanor and off putting half-truths. Most times when Laura looks at Carmilla, studying the curve of her jaw, the break in her nose, the old heartbreak in her eyes, Carmilla blinks back and looks away with a grimace. Most times with Carmilla, it is a frustrating two step of callous indifference and heartbreaking honesty that leaves Laura's chest aching for her sake. Laura mostly wants only to push her fingers through Carmilla's hair so that maybe she will spill all her secrets with a whispered _just for you_ against Laura's skin.

It's different now, with steel in her voice and a shaking in her ribcage. Laura still can't move, but only now it is in part because she is paralyzed with a fear of this sad, sad girl holding her. "But I had to," Carmilla says, "because, Laura, you - "

"Hold on. Just - what are you talking about?" she asks again. Dread grows against her spine, heavy and pressing. "Just let me sit up for a second."

"She already took Ell. I won't let her take you too," Carmilla says, and Laura thinks she honestly feels her heart break. Carmilla pulls away from her then, propped up on elbows and the ends of her dark hair tickling along Laura skin. She swallows. "You're _mine_."

"Carmilla -"

And then she has her teeth at Laura's neck, fingers curled around the back of her skull. It yanks a cry from her. She marks Laura, a matching set on each side of her throat, as Carmilla's lips and teeth form mine, _mine_.

 _God_ , Laura don't understand even as Carmilla pulls her veins.

 

+

 

She watches the video later, with a bloody cloth to her neck and betrayal rotting her teeth.

(Deal. dealdealdealdealdealdeal -

Laura feels sick.)

 

+

 

Laura can't find it in her to even look at Carmilla.

She goes to class, sleeps, and spends almost all her time in Perry's room, where LaFontaine is giggling and shaking their hips to some song only they can hear. Perry tries so desperately to keep the tears off her cheeks. Most of the time Laura can hardly bear it.

It's only when her eyes are heavy and LaFontaine is pulling on her hand, asking for just one more dance, that Laura can crawl back to her room. Carmilla is almost always there, fingers around a book and worry in the lines of her face. It sets Laura's teeth on edge when she see her, neck thrumming painfully, and Laura tries to stop her arms from shaking.

Carmilla is always there when she stumbles back, high on sadness and sugar, and Laura watches as her shoulders melt with relief.

"Stop it," Laura tells Carmilla one time, when her covers are pulled to her chin and Carmilla is staring at Laura from the corner of her eye. _Stop it_ , she rolls over and breathes as loudly as she can, because maybe then Laura can focus on the air across her lungs and the warmth in her fingertips and forget the way Carmilla won't leave her be, wretched and damned.

Laura scratches at her neck because Carmilla is stuck in her blood and across Laura's veins. Sometimes she thinks maybe that necklace didn't just put Carmilla's mother inside her. But that is a lie she already knows because she closes her eyes and sees Carmilla's hesitant face and, _of course I'm doing it for you_. Laura can't look at her anymore without her chest aching and she is terrified it's already too late. Carmilla might be written across the parts of her that Laura cannot erase, engraved with diamond and kissed by blood.

Laura tells her to stop. Carmilla flinches a little but doesn't look away.

 

+

 

" _Danny_ ," Laura cries, watching the way her mouth wraps around Laura's name. She sends a smile, small and scared, to Carmilla when she relents. _Deal_ , Carmilla says, and Danny breathes relief.

 

+

 

Laura tries to save them. It's at the party, ( _the party_ , LaFontaine mumbles when Laura and Perry leave them tied up on her bed) where students are drunk and stumbling. Will is holding something that looks terrifyingly sharp on the stage and there is a dead goat at his feet. Its blood spills across the stage and a cheer goes up from the crowd when it screams.

Laura winces but don't really listen to what he is saying, instead fingers tightening around the stake in her hand and the warmth of Perry at her back. Carmilla is in the crowd somewhere, but Laura doesn't remember where she managed to lose Carmilla as she squeezed her way through the drunken bodies towards the foot of the stage. Carmilla had been insistent, pleading even, when she found Laura at the edges of the party.

 _Laura, I can't let you_ \- she had started to say when Laura pushed herself into the mass of bodies.

Will shouts now and grins when everyone yells back, blood smeared across his teeth. Perry's fingers tightened around Laura's wrist, her gaze scanning the crowd and an encouraging little smile across her face. When Laura turns back the goat has stopped twitching and - and she doesn't understand how monstrous Silas hasn't swallowed her up yet.

But maybe it has, she thinks, fingering the bandage of her neck.

Someone elbows her in the chest when she is close to the stage, spilling alcohol down Laura's front. Her shirt absorbs the most of it, causing Laura's mind to stutter over the image of Danny with blood-soaked cotton, her neck red and sweltering and darker than her beautiful hair. Laura takes in a shuttering breath, clinging to the cold spreading across her skin and the red in her mind.

Laura imagines Danny, so tall and so brave and the iron across her frame.

Will smiles when Laura climbs the stage, fingers flicking the knife lazily, and his eyes shift from her face to the crowd, head cocked when someone shouts her name. Laura thinks she sees a flash of war paint when she eyes the crowd, whether it is the Zetas or Summer Society Laura does not know. They are after Carmilla she'd imagine. Or maybe Laura. Probably both.

Laura swallows, fear settling and sinking heavy in her gut, and tightens her fingers around the stake until it splinters under her fingernails.

"Nice shirt," Will says, eyebrows wiggling a little and Laura bites down on her lip with a grimace.

"Where are they?" she asks, jabbing the wood threatening.

It's not very intimidating, Laura finds, when Will giggles a little. "Okay, I get it now. You are just _adorable_ ," he says with a lick of blood from the knife. Laura can see Perry flinch from the corner of her eye. She wants to reach for Perry, palm warm and reassuring

A scream goes up from the crowd and Laura can't stop her neck from jerking, eying the gap forming in the mass of students from Carmilla's flying fists. Laura thinks there might be a body on the ground near her, students scrambling away from one another and from the legion of girls coming after Carmilla in a swarm.

Laura's eyes widen. Carmilla is terrifying, shouting her name with a fury and dropping two girls onto their backs in quick succession. Their broken moans around shattered bone get lost in the screams.

"Honestly," Will says then, a roll to his eyes and his face next to Laura's after she blinks. He grins.

Laura watches as Perry is tackled to the ground by what could be a few panicked freshman or a couple of Zetas who don't really know better. She hopes it is the former when her shout is quick to mingle with the rest of the chaos caused by Carmilla. Perry's name is only beginning to curl around Laura's mouth when Will grabs her by the throat, knifed tucked tight against her skin, and the fingers of his other hand ripping her arm back painfully.

Laura shouts and the knife nicks her.

"I don't think so," Will says, licking the length of his teeth when a bead of red falls from the cut on Laura's skin.

"Where's Danny?" she asks, swallowing around the metal to her jugular.

He laughs a little, the rumble radiating against Laura's back. She cannot see Perry or Carmilla anymore, only the emptying quad with crushed cups and goat blood slippery under her shoes. The knife digs into her neck even more, pulling a hot trail of red down Laura's skin before Will shifts and licks at it.

She cries out, trying to pull away from his warm tongue and wondering fingers. The knife drops to the stage next to her when he growls and abandons it to hold her in place. His grip is like stone, unbreakable and crushing on Laura's fragile human frame.

Carmilla is there, suddenly, when Will drags a canine down the length of Laura's throat. Someone's blood is smeared a little at the corner of her lips when she says, "Let. go."

"She's a cutie," Will teases. "And here I was thinking you kept her just for how ridiculous kinky she must be in bed."

A trembling breath leaves Laura and Carmilla winces a little.

"Where are they?" Laura asks again, ignoring the pain spreading across her arm with his tight grip. There are tears in her eyes, from the pain or desperation she does not know.

Will rolls his eyes and his breath hits her cheek, iron heavy on his tongue. Laura shivers. "I thought Mother told you to take care of this, Kitty," he says instead, twisting her arm a little further until Laura cannot help the small cry of pain.

Carmilla bares her teeth, a snarl.

"The deal was you take care of your roommate and I won't eat her for lunch," Will says, his lips dragging across Laura's bandaged neck once again. She twists but her vision darkens when it pulls back on her shoulder. "Since it looks like you've let her off the leash again, I think I'll just -"

He pulls her hair with his free head, yanking Laura's head to the side and exposing her neck bare. Her shoulder makes a deafening crack when he flushes Laura against him. She thinks she screams, her veins on fire and waves of agonizing pain throughout her arm as Laura's mind tumbles.

Will smiles around the skin between his teeth and his fingers crush the bones of her wrist. Laura feels like she is being pulled apart at the seams, all blood and shattered bone and a tremendous fury.

She can only think of the fire in her veins and across her frame. Blood is sliding down Laura's chest from between Will's messy pulls of warmth and she is becoming lightheaded at an alarmingly rate. Laura blinks at the stars and prays that maybe there will be a merciful ancient to help make the pain leave her quickly.

Laura is not afraid of death, of the dark after the life leaves her. She is not afraid of the possible whisper of her name from a long dead mother, but Laura is terrified of the end in hot blood at her neck and a whimper at her teeth. She is afraid of the things she will leave.

 _Danny_ , Laura thinks, _so, so sorry_.

But Will is ripped from her then, the force of it tearing his bite open and pulling Laura's broken shoulder even more. It sends her stumbling across the stage until she hits the altar where the goat is growing cold. Familiar hands find Laura easily, holding her sagging frame when her hair starts to brush against the bloody stone. Carmilla is there, palms wiping at Laura cheeks and her name so heavy at Carmilla's protruding teeth.

A gasp of her responded name leaves Laura weakly.

"You know you really shouldn't - " Will starts, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.

Something close to a growl leaves Carmilla when she steps in front of Laura's trembling body. Her forehead falls against the warmth of Carmilla's back and the fingers of her working hand find the holes at her neck, trying quell the leak of blood.

Her arm is still on fire.

"If you don't leave I will kill you."

"You wouldn't dare," Will says, licking the last of Laura's blood from his lips, "Mother would - "

"She'd be upset. Eternity is a long time, though."

Laura is swaying a little on her feet and Carmilla has to pull her upright from behind. Her fingers tighten around one of Laura's belt loops and her thumb is pressed against the skin of Laura's waist, a small reassurance. Will watches the action, brow furrowed.

The button-up Laura wears has long since soaked through to her tank top and bra, causing a shiver to roll up her spine and jostling Laura's bad shoulder. She whimpers. Carmilla turns to look at Laura, something hard in her eyes when she sees the blood and alcohol soaking Laura's shirt.

"Come on, Kitty. You know better than to mess with Mother."

"Then you should know better then to mess with me," she snaps back. Carmilla is slowly leading Laura to the upturned chair behind the drum set, helping her sagging weight as the blood becomes thicker around her fingers. Laura trips twice, whining when it jolts her broken bones.

She still can't shake Will's gaze, hidden behind Carmilla's careful touch. 

"Well, I guess I better tell Mother what you've decided then," he says, grinning a little. "I can't wait for her to find this one. I always thought it was too bad I wasn't around to see what she did with your old one. What was her name? Belle?"

Something close to a growl builds in Carmilla, rumbling against Laura ribcage as she holds her close. Laura can't help the tremor throughout her frame it causes. It cuts off quickly when Carmilla's lips brush against Laura's ear, murmuring, "I'm going to do something you will not like."

 _Don't you always_ , Laura wants to joke, but the pain snuffs it out in her throat. She shifts her head - a nod.

Carmilla is gone, suddenly, a blur across the stage before Laura's eyes. She blinks, unable to see the way Carnilla's arm comes up and around Will. She hears a grunt and snarl before Will is sprawled on the ground, Carmilla behind him.

"Won't - let - you," Carmilla grunts between her teeth. She has her arm around his head, the other at his chin, and she twists.

Laura's mouth clamps around a gasp when his neck gives, angled and broken. He falls to the stage with a thump and blood splashes across his frame, soaking his clothes. Carmilla is a blur once again when she rips up a piece of stage. Another noise, something Laura is afraid to place, leaves her when Carmilla plunges the old rotting wood into Will's chest.

Oh god. Laura squeezes her eyes shut for a second when an awful yelp leaves him. _Oh god_ , Carmilla is standing over Will breathing heavily.

Laura thinks the world is fading from the edges of her vision, dark and empty, when Carmilla looks up at Laura, her fingers clenched and a deep hunger in her eyes, and oh god, oh god, oh god, oh god, Laura can't feel anything.

"Laura," she starts.

Laura doesn't know where Perry is and her arm is aching and limp at her side, and Will is now twitching in the pool of blood across the stage. Carmilla is next to Laura then with a worried say of her name, her palms uncurled and open and red. Laura flinches, taking a step back and slipping in sticky wet blood.

"Please," Carmilla says, following her, "Laura."

Laura squeezes her eyes shut, focused on the throbbing pain down her side and continuous shouts yard away and the noise Will's neck gave before Carmilla pulled and pulled and -

Carmilla presses her trembling fingers to Laura's face slowly, hesitantly, and a cry leaves Laura. "Please don't," Carmilla says, her voice thick and oh so holy.

"You just - " Laura starts, another cry ripped from her, "you - "

"I know," she says as her thumb brushes across Laura's cheek. "but he was going to kill you."

" _Carmilla_ ," Laura sobs a little, trying to focus on the way Carmilla's eyes watch her gently. But she can't get it out of her head, the snarl on Carmilla's lips when Will fell and fell.

Carmilla swallows. "I said you wouldn't like it," she says, her voice heavy and so very loving against Laura's frame.

Laura feels a cry catch in her throat. Danny is somewhere being led towards death and her arm still feels like it's on fire and Carmilla is still _looking_ at her, Will's neck twisted under her hands when Laura blinks. Laura's chest feels empty and her head feels far too full and she is so very scared of just how little she cared when Carmilla's hands ripped the life from Will. Only the snarl on her lips and delight hidden in her eyes at the sight of Will falling keeps Laura rooted in place.

"Laura," Carmilla says.

"She's killing them," Laura says, because she can't get the image of Danny's neck twisted and crooked next to Will. She's having trouble finding breath around the words, "She's killing - Danny is - oh _God_. And you - "

A wince rolls through Carmilla. "Laura, your arm."

"Carmilla, she's - "

"I know."

" _Carmilla_."

"I know. We need to look at your arm," Carmilla says, her hands finding the curve of Laura's hips as she drags her a little closer. She flutters across Laura's twisted bones lightly, hissing when Laura winces in pain. Laura doesn't care about the pain rolling through her side because Danny, Will - _Danny_.

"Carmilla, please," she cannot help but beg, her good fingers knotted at the base of Carmilla's shirt. " _Please_ ," Laura says, because Danny and Betty and Elsie are stuck in her  brain, throats smiling bloodily to her incompetent screams. If she squeezes her eyes closed Laura can see the curve of Carmilla's smile as her mothers empty heart finds her hand, still dripping and dark. _Is this what you want_? she can imagine Carmilla saying, placing the wrinkled dead thing in Laura's hands, and Danny at her knees but very much alive behind them.

Laura trembles from the thought. _Please, please, please_ , she sears into Carmilla's skin when she pulls Laura against her, Laura's face pressed to the crook of her neck.

And when Carmilla's fingers curl around the back of her head, so soft and so gentle, Laura sobs her name.

 

+

 

"I'll try," she whispers when Laura's bones have been reset and the tears have dried on her face. She blinks and Carmilla traces the curve of her cheek. "I'll try," she says again, and kisses Laura like she has been wanting for weeks.  
  
The sword is still buried in that cavern and Carmilla is only armed with a stake and three hundred years of pain, and god, _god_ , Laura kisses her because she is so very brave.

 

 

+

 

Carmilla comes back later that night, blood in splatters across her frame and hissing when she shifts on her bed. Laura doesn't know if vampires can bleed their stolen blood, and she is far too afraid to ask because of what it might mean.

But Laura thinks maybe hope can flutter in her gut, because she does not believe Carmilla's mother is one to let betrayal go unpunished. Laura thinks she might take Carmilla and string her up with chains if the Dean knew Carmilla tried to end her unnaturally long life. Or maybe she'd string up Laura instead, forcing Carmilla to watch.

And it's when Carmilla shakes her head, eyes closed and fingers twitching at her knees, that Laura - Laura can't remember much of anything.

 

+

 

"At least you saved one of your friends," Carmilla says to Laura days later.

Laura is sprawled in her bed, sling itching on her skin, and heartache so heavy against her ribcage. Laura closes her eyes at Carmilla's voice and try and forget the tremble in her friends frame when they sat with her. Laura thinks the Dean can take more than someone's life from them when LaFontaine can't stop the shaking in their hands and have to look to Perry.

Laura laughs a little, bitter and hard, and she can't help the glare from finding its way across her face. "That just means they took someone else," she says, and turns so that she lays heavily on her injured arm.

(And when Laura closes her eyes it's Danny she imagines pulling her onto her back. It's Danny who says, "Stop it, Laur. You're going to make your shoulder even worse." It's Danny who smiles when Laura runs her fingers across Danny's face because she's alive, she's alive, _she's alive_.

But Laura blinks, and Carmilla standing above her, all teeth and rotten hearts. _Don't be an idiot_ , she says and gently readjusts Laura's sling, even when her mind pleads for Danny's tall red frame.)

 

+

 

"Why didn't she kill you?" Laura accuses one time when Carmilla comes back with a flush in her cheeks. The Dean had made an announcement earlier, something about reading week, but she couldn't find it in her enough to care. At this point Laura doubts she'll live long enough to see her father again anyways.

It makes her wonder, though, why her heart isn't on the Dean's silver platter with Carmilla's.

There is a pause in Carmilla's rummaging and Laura imagines the words being dulled and softened in her mind. "Mother is always true to her word," she finally says.

Carmilla won't look at Laura, for which she is grateful, as her face crumples in something Laura cannot place. Maybe it is the bone-deep tired she feels, built on anger and a pitiful burst of sorrow she does not deserve. Maybe it is the ache Laura feels at the curve of her ribs, heavy and cutting and bored of waiting for the Dean to rip her pretty heart from Laura's chest.

Carmilla turns a little to eye her over her shoulder. "I'm sorry about your friend."

"No, you're not."

"No." Carmilla shakes her head, turning back to her bed. "I am sorry that it makes you sad. I had to keep my word too."

Laura smothers a tiny cry against the warm of her palm. Carmilla tightens.

She thinks of the limp in Carmilla's leg when she came back that night, blood and tears across her skin. Laura wonders what parts of her being she had to give for that word, or if it is still locked up in a coffin underground and this is simply the easiest way to stuff the parts of herself that she's missing. The thought grows in Laura, rotten, and she has to look away from the tight of Carmilla's shoulders.

Danny's throat smiles so sweetly when Laura blinks. She wonders who holds the knife, Carmilla or herself. It doesn't matter really, not when the light gobbled Danny up and spit back the ripped edges of her cutting memory.

Poor, poor Danny; poor Betty and Elsie and all the girls stuck in the light; poor Carmilla forever alive in the dark.

Laura thinks of Ell, the girl she never knew, and wonder if Carmilla understands her pain.

(She does, of course, parts of it at least. Laura ignores the way she can't begin to understand Carmilla's.)

 

+

 

Air gets caught in Laura's throat when she finds smeared chocolate across her pale sheets. There are crumbs when she brushes her hand across the fabric trying to force the breath to her lungs. It is stupid and silly but Laura doesn't want dirty sheets anymore. She doesn't want empty days full of heartache and Carmilla looking at her with that _stupid_ soulful expression that pulls Laura.

She is so, so tired; of Silas, of Danny ripped open under her, of Carmilla's tiny grin. Laura's chest aches.

She cannot breathe because there is chocolate in Laura's sheets and the girl responsible is also the one she can't carve out of her head. Danny is fresh dead because of Carmilla but the tremble in Laura's bones reminds her that Carmilla is also so much more than that single act. Laura wishes she could only think of Carmilla as the monster with blood in her mouth and Danny's throat slit underhand. Laura remembers teeth at her neck but she cannot forget the curl of Carmilla's adoring smile or the worry at her face when Laura blinks through pain.

Danny is dead and there is chocolate on her sheets and Laura doesn't know how to carve Carmilla out, how to flush her system clean and holy and not full of screaming blood.

Laura pounds a fist against her head, once, twice. She is so very tired and wants only to forget.

When she tries to breathe the light gets stuck in the back of her mouth. Laura tries not to, but she thinks she might be dead, or she thinks she might wish to be dead, or maybe Laura just wants and wants but cannot take. Laura has to squeeze her eyes shut and tell herself again and again that she is the one who is alive and not buried with the rest of those girls.

 _Alive, alive_ , Laura chokes and wish it was Danny instead.

 

+

 

Laura's shoulder heals slowly.

Her mind - well. That's another matter entirely.

 

+

 

Carmilla winces a little when Laura shouts.

She rips things from the walls and airs the grief rotting her chest. Laura's fists are bloody when she presses them to her face and yells, because she is stupid, stupid, Laura, the one who doesn't know what's best, doesn't listen and kills all her friends.

Carmilla had warned her again and again and why didn't she bother to listen?

Laura heaves a sob for the first time in weeks. Stupid, stupid, she can't get anything out of her head.

Carmilla tries to offer her a comforting arm but Laura knocks it away, smashing a lamp across the floor in the process. It's not fair, she thinks, but neither is Carmilla.

There must have been something Carmilla could have done. There must have been something else in her chest besides that awful love for Laura, something that could have torn the Dean's head from her neck. It is not fair of her to accuse Carmilla of these things, but she cannot yell her grievances at Danny's empty grave.

Laura is so angry at both of them, her stupidly beautiful brave dead girls, that sometimes she thinks it just might consume her. The fire across her bones will leave nothing but ash and this terrible, terrible anger that Laura cannot shake from her system.

So she screams and cries and kicks, and tries to claw out the anger filling her. Carmilla is there when she cuts her hand on glass and when Laura tries to pull away from her probing fingers. Danny is not there when another sob leaves Laura hotly because she is in the ground somewhere with the relief of Laura's name on her cold lips.

Laura thinks that maybe she is somewhere between the two, thrashing in the ground for one last breath of air between the dirt and anger stuffing her mouth. Maybe she deserves it, maybe she doesn't. Laura don't really know anymore.

(Don't care, more like. Don't care, don't care, don't care.)

 

+

 

"Sorry, LaF," she says, heart dropping at the flinch they give.

Did she kill them too? Probably.

 

+

 

Laura's father calls three times a week.

She never answers.

 

+

 

The thumb of Laura's left hand is still bandaged and raw when Carmilla kisses her. It is the first time since that awful night Laura still can't really get out of her head. Snow is tangling in their hair and Carmilla's mouth tastes like the hot chocolate they've been passing between. Her tongue is warm, contrasted to the fingers cold at the curve of Laura's waist, and it pulls a shiver. Laura has forgotten just how easily she sinks into Carmilla's kisses, filling her mind with something other than the anger that never leaves her these days.

“Laura,” Carmilla says into the space of Laura's lips when her injured hand wraps around the back of Carmilla's neck. She ignores the whisper of her name and slants her lips harder because this makes it easy to forget. Laura feels the curve of Carmilla's tongue and she doesn't have to think of Danny. “Hey, just - hey, slow down for a second.“

Laura pulls away and has to bite down a sob. "Please, Carmilla, can we just not talk?"

There must be something in her voice because Carmilla's eyes narrow. Snowflakes catch in her eyelashes before she blinks and says, "You're thinking about her, aren't you?"

 _Deal_.

Laura winces.

"That's what I thought."

“Well, what were you expecting Carmilla?" she snaps, bandages straining, fists against her thighs. Carmilla pulls away and shoves her bare hands into the deeps of her coat pockets. "Did you think we could just happily fall into bed after you murdered my friends?"

Carmilla's jaw twitches when she looks away. "I didn't do that."

"You might as well have," Laura says, watching as Carmilla's eyes slip shut. Frost clings to her breath when the words leave Laura, lingering in the space between. She thinks they might sting when Carmilla turns away to look at a few students sliding across the quad.

"Fuck you, Laura," she says instead, foot kicking a chunk of ice.

A scoff falls from Laura and she blinks back tears. "Wow, Carm. Okay."

Laura turns on her heel, intent on finding somewhere that does not remind her of Danny and where Carmilla cannot follow. She takes a few steps, head tilting when she hears Carmilla behind her. "What are you doing?"

"I'm not going to let you - "

"Oh, you're not going to let me? You don't get a say in what I may or may not do."

Carmilla tugs at the sleeve of Laura's coat, pulling them to a stop. Laura glares at her hand for a moment before stubbornly looking away  "I don't give a shit if you have a problem with me, I'm not going to let you go walking around alone when my Mother is out for blood."

"You're not my friend and you're certainly not my girlfriend so you don't - "

"Last time I let you go I ended up killing my brother for you," Carmilla snaps, pulling at the sleeve of Laura's coat roughly and causing her to stumble into Carmilla. She catches Laura with one hand at her shoulder, squeezed tight. "Last time you almost died, so, yeah, I'm going to walk with you."

"I didn't ask you to do that!" Laura says, knocking Carmilla's hand from her frame. "I didn't ask you to start protecting me, Carmilla. You can't just pin that on me."

"What if I do? You pin those girls deaths on me."

"That's different."

"Of course it is," she scoffs. "You just can't deal with the fact that you lost. I told you - I _warned_ you - and you wouldn't listen. You had to keep going after those stupid fucking girls."

Laura winces, the truth of her words cutting. It is another lacerations deep in her bones. _Those girl_ , Laura thinks, _might have been the lucky ones_. The bandages around her hand is unraveling when she looks down and wipes at the moisture collected at the corner of her eyes. Laura swallows down a guilty cry. "Please, Carmilla," she finally sighs, "just - please go. Leave me alone."

The wind bites at her cheeks and Carmilla won't look away.

"No."

(Laura hates the way she is relieved.)

 

 


	2. we know your games your serial crimes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _I'll try_ , Carmila said once, and Laura wishes she wouldn't.

 

 

Laura tries to run.

She has three bags, two full of clothes and the last filled with stupid sentimental objects she cannot bear to leave. She hides them under her bed and waits for the night when Carmilla slinks from their room in search of food.

Laura runs, ignoring the way her chest screams to stay.

She hops a train for Graz and slouches in her seat as the rolling hills of Austria pass outside the window. A hoodie covers her face and Laura is fairly certain she is getting the side eye from a woman three seats over. It might have something to do with the rips in her jeans or the flinch in her shoulders every time the train rattles.

Laura expects the Dean to walk through the compartment at any moment, her fingers bloodied and Carmilla dragged brokenly at her feet. She never does, but Laura holds her breath every time the door opens anyways.

But she makes it to Graz and finds a hostel. She spends four days in her little room, counting and re-counting the meager funds she has. Laura paces the floor and runs her fingers through her hair and cries because she is so very alone and so very afraid and it's not fair, she thinks. Laura misses Danny with her tall frame, and LaFontaine, and Perry, and she tries to ignore the way she misses Carmilla's snarl.

Laura spends four days in Graz before a man finds her and drags her back to Silas kicking and screaming.

(She wonders, later, with a split lip and her hands tied behind her back, just how long she had been expecting it. Laura lies to herself, _you didn't know_ , and bitterly denies the excited twinge in her chest when she remembers her dorm room and Carmilla's dark curls. She tongues the iron from her broken lip and doesn't admit to the hope in her chest because Laura wants to leave her rotten heart at Silas and run until her brain isn't screaming for bloody kisses.

No, no, she can't think about her bones aching to stay.)

 

+

 

"Why haven't you killed me?" Laura asks, foolish bravery crawling its way up her spine, "It seems like I'm more trouble than its worth."

The Dean laughs at that, sending a chill through Laura's frame. She gazes at Laura, slowly, and circles around in a predatory stance before stopping and leaning to look Laura in the face. Her breath smells like blood and her teeth are startlingly white when she licks them. "Now, why would I do that?"

"Because I know too much."

She presses her tongue to a canine, baring all. "Yes, I do agree in that respect."

"So - "

The Dean heaves a sigh when the words leave Laura. Her fingers cup the curve of Laura's chin and she twists her head side to side. The Dean squints, examining the mole at the corner of Laura's cheek. "In an ideal world I would be eating soup from your skull, but my Mircalla has a certain, ah, fondness for you.  I cannot pretend I understand why she would find such affection for something like you, but she is a foolish child clinging to the notion of love."

"Carmilla doesn't love me," Laura says, but it is a lie they both know quite well.

"Ms. Hollis do not condescend me. We both know you are more intelligent than that, " the Dean tuts, releasing her hold. "If I learned anything from the last time she found herself infatuated with one of you little creatures, her idea of love is a far more powerful tool than that timeout I sent her to could ever be."

Laura swallows, a sharp panic gnawing her stomach. She cannot begin to imagine what it was like in that coffin for Carmilla, imprisoned for love and drowning in the regret of it between the mouthfuls of the thing that gave her life. Laura cannot begin to imagine what will happen to Carmilla this time, when she is dead and bloody.

The Dean grins.

"Isn't that right, sweetheart?" she asks, eyes flickering to a point over Laura's shoulder. Laura does not dare look, fearing the Dean's sharp teeth might sink into the skin of her neck if she gives the opportunity to do so.

Carmilla does not respond. Laura hears a shuffling until Carmilla is but a few feet from her. It's reassuring, her presence in the light of the Dean's smile. But Laura hates that the Dean knows this, studying the way her shoulders sink in relief as Carmilla turns to lean against the wall. Carmilla is the picture of indifference, but they both know better.

_Go away_ , Laura thinks, _go away, go away, stop loving me_.

"Now then," the Dean helps pull Laura from her seat, hands brushing across her shoulders and smoothing the wrinkles from her shirt. She smiles a little, fingers hooking around Laura's elbow. "Since we're all here, there are just a few things I want to discuss."

Her nails pinch Laura's skin and she twists her hand. Laura moves with it, trying to keep the pain from her features. "There will be no more of this running nonsense, from either of you. Yes?"

Carmilla pushes herself from the wall and takes a step towards them. The Dean twists even harder, pulling a quick nod from Laura. Carmilla stops.

"You know how busy I am sweetheart. I can't keep sending people after you, it's a waste of time for the both of us."

Laura's arm is starting to burn. She looks to Carmilla, hoping for the other to end her agony. She remembers Will's neck twisted around her fingers, and it is easy to imagine the way Carmilla might rip open the Dean now, smearing blood on Laura's cheeks with a whispered mine, mine, mine.

She wants it. She wants it with the fire in her veins and the blood pounding at her throat. Laura blinks and wonders if Carmilla might listen when she whispers, _do it. Do it now_.

"I don't think I need to tell you that you are walking a very thin line, Mircalla," she says, Laura's bad arm twisted further. Laura bites her lip hard enough to open the scabbed skin and whimpers pitifully. Carmilla trembles at the sound. "I've let you and this little thing live because of silly sentiment, but trust me when I say that will not stop me if you disobey me one last time."

Laura watches Carmilla's throat when she swallows and shifts when the edges of her vision darken with pain. "Fine," Carmilla spits, fists against her thighs and her arms straining. "Fine, just - stop. Stop it."

"Good," the Dean says and pulls on Laura's arm a little more until it pops. Laura screams, unwittingly. "Remember, Mircalla. I will not tell you again."

The Dean shoves Laura then, ignoring the way she stumbles blindly into Carmilla's arms. Her shoulder knocks against Carmilla's bicep and she can't help the cry of pain that escapes her. Carmilla winces and looks at Laura, brushing the hair from Laura's face gently, and avoiding the useless arm that she clutches.

"You really should join me for dinner soon, darling," the Dean says, taking a seat at her impressively large desk. Laura glares at it through tears. "I've been dreadfully lonely since you took my son from me."

"William wasn't - " Carmilla starts before she bites her lip, swallowing the words back down.

"I think a little mother-daughter bonding will do us good. You can even bring your pet if you'd like." She looks at Laura then, her grin growing at the watery glare. "If I didn't break her too much that is."

"Fine," Carmilla says, her thumb finding the skin of Laura's hip when she tugs Laura to her side. Laura cannot help the small hiccup that leaves her when her head falls against Carmilla's shoulder, the Dean disappearing from her sight.

_Run away_ , she wants to say when Carmilla steers Laura from the office. _Leave me and run until no one can find you_. _Run because you're the only one who can._

That's a lie.

Laura pretends to hate that she stays.

 

+

 

They don't talk after Carmilla pulls Laura's arm, popping it back in place.

Laura finds it hard to breathe, the room stifling and Carmilla's gaze pulling the air from her lungs. Her bags are neatly piled on her bed while Carmilla's books are dumped haphazardly across the floor. Tears are dried on Laura's cheeks and her mind is so hazy with a throbbing pain she can't do much more than stare at the flowers of her comforter, allowing Carmilla to gentle ease her arm into a sling. Laura's shoulder never really healed right the first time, so she doubts it'll do much good now.

Carmilla holds a glass to Laura's lips as she swallows the pain medication that Carmilla had gotten for her weeks ago.

It's too sweet, too good of her to do. Laura turns away.

"Please," Laura starts and then swallows. She tries to think of the things she wants Carmilla to know, the things she tried to run from. Laura thinks of the things that make her stay.

_I'll try_ , Carmila said once, and Laura wishes she wouldn't.

Carmilla's jaw is clenched when she forces Laura to turn back to her. Laura thinks she feels Carmilla's hands shake. "You stupid fucking _child_ ," Carmilla hisses, fingers pressed at her chin. _  
_

Laura shakes her head. "Carmilla - "

"I thought they took you," she says, and Laura cannot bear to hear the terror in her voice, "I thought she took you from me and that I was going to go back in that box."

"I'm sorry," Laura says, "I - I didn't think - "

"That's right you didn't think," Carmilla cuts. Laura's chin aches after Carmilla lets go to brush her fingers across Laura's jaw. They press against the side of her neck, Laura's pulse against her skin, and Carmilla won't look away. "You were fucking stupid."

"Carm - "

"You can't - " Carmilla takes in a sharp breath, and Laura is terrified to see tears collecting in her eyes. " _Fuck_. I can't lose you too, okay? Is that what you want to hear? Is that what will make you stay?"

"That's not why I left," Laura says, her voice thick. "You know that's not why I left."

Carmilla pulls her closer, until Laura can count her lashes, tangled and dark against the flush in her cheeks. "Then stay," she murmurs. "Stay for me."

"Do you know what your asking?" Laura says. She knows what awaits her in the dark of Silas. She knows what her heart will look like, crushed underfoot and painting Carmilla's trembling hands. She knows how Carmilla will shatter, cutting and empty across the earth when Laura is gone. She does not need to imagine Carmilla's old screaming eyes as she finally buckles under the weight of her years.

_Oh, Carmilla. Darling, dead Carmilla, asking me to die beside you.  
_

Carmilla nods, slowly.

What a pair they make, with more sin across their shoulders than Laura can possibly count. What a beautiful mess they've made, Laura thinks, and pictures the swirls of shapes written in blood on Carmilla's skin.

Laura lets out a wet sigh, resigning herself to be another dead girl roaming this rotten patch of Styrian earth.

"For you."

There is a hot, pressing throb in Laura's ribcage when Carmilla's fingers quiver at their place and her eyes fill with something so old Laura doesn't know if she could even give it a name. Carmilla leans in, brushing their lips slowly once, then twice, and curves her tongue around Laura's name.

"You promise?" Carmilla asks. Laura tries counting the stars in her eyes.

"I won't leave," Laura says slowly, the promise heavy and with a pinch in her chest. She looks over Carmilla's shoulder, finding a bare patch of wall so that she does not have to look at Carmilla's gaze - the one she can't shake.

"I'll stay but I won't forgive you. You just let Danny die, you let them all die, and I - I can't forget that no matter how hard I try."

Carmilla blinks slowly. "You don't have to. You just need to know that you're first. Always."

"That's not fair," Laura says. Her heart is pounding so hard she can feel it in her joints. Her good hand is shaking at its place pressed to Carmilla's elbow. "You can't just chose who lives and dies. You can't pick me to live every time just because you don't want to be alone."

"Yes, I can."

"Carmilla that's not - "

"Don't you get it? I will always choose you," she interrupts, fingers cold against Laura's face, and teeth bared like the animal the Dean made her to be. Laura hates her for it, for the way she can't look away, and Carmilla can read it on her face. Carmilla traces the curve of her temple, fingertips sliding through Laura's hair, the touch of it alive and scorching on her skin, and says, "I don't care what it takes. I don't care who it takes. Even if you hate me, cupcake, it will always be you first."

Laura's stomach drops. She hiccups and Carmilla smiles a little at her.

And, dear god, the ache inside Laura splinters, cutting her open and bleeding her dry. Laura cannot stop the tears that leave her, because Carmilla has her so completely. Because she fills Laura until Laura doesn't know where she starts and Carmilla ends. Because if the Dean cracked open her ribs, Laura thinks she might find Carmilla's dead heart beating in the space and Laura's in Carmilla's cold, worn fingers. Laura turns her head a little to lean into Carmilla's wandering touch, and she whispers Carmilla's name like a prayer. _Carmilla_ , Laura says and cries. _Carmilla, Carmilla_ , and she hates, hates, _hates_ her.

(Never. _Never_.)

 

+

 

_Deal_ , Carmilla said once, for Laura, for Danny, for her mother. _Deal_ , she said, and didn't realize what she was taking.

 

+

 

"I love -" Carmilla says, swallows, and shakes her head.

Laura does not condescend her with a response, only turning away with burning tears. Laura doesn't see her for days.

 

+

 

"Mircalla," the Dean says, her figure towering over Laura's bed. She grins when she sees Laura, a light greeting leaving her as her fingers trail across Laura's neck. Laura's pulse point is jumping when the Dean finds it. Carmilla growls. "Be a good girl," she tells Carmilla, her nail digging into Laura's skin with a pinch as she side-eyes her roommate.

"What do you want?"

The Dean smiles again and scratches Laura until blood wells up along her nail. Laura gasps a little, sinking deeper into her covers before she turns to Carmilla. "Let's just say there's a little mess I need you to clean up."

"I'm not your maid," Carmilla snaps, twisting so she is wedged between Laura and her mother. The Dean laughs then and Laura shifts, uncomfortable with the sound. There is nothing she wants more than to pull the covers over her head until this world is nothing but a terrifying nightmare and she will wake to the gentle soothing of her father. But she doesn't - she can't, Carmilla's trembling frame keeping Laura in place.

The Dean has her fingers at Laura's chin then, forcing her to look up. Laura's heart shutters loudly. She know they both can hear it, the Dean smiling as Carmilla winces and curls her fingers around Laura's ankle reassuringly. "Darling, you are whatever I need you to be. Isn't that right?"

Carmilla swallows. Laura's chin hurts from the grip, but she thinks it almost hurts more when Carmilla nods and follows her mother.

(And when Carmilla comes back, blood across her hands and traces of it on her chin, Laura turns on her bed and stare at the wall until it burns when she blinks. _Monster_ , she wants to say, but it dies in her rotten chest when Carmilla curls up behind her and runs her fingers through Laura's hair gently. _Monster_ , Laura wants to say, and wonders just who exactly she means.)

 

+

 

Carmilla sets her mug next to Laura's hand gently, cocoa sloshing against the sides and fingers fluttering along Laura's arm when she turns to her bed. Laura looks at her a little, from the corner of her eye, as Carmilla fingers through her book and sips from her own glass. It's a simple thing when her mouth pull into a small 'o', eyebrows furrowed, and a smudge of red at the corner of her lip. It is a simple thing when she peers up at Laura, a gentle smirk across her features, but Laura nearly breaks from the weight of it.

_Oh_ , she thinks, _oh Carmilla._

 

+

 

Laura wakes her with a trembling thumb dragged across the smooth of her collarbone. Carmilla starts, her hand finding its way around Laura's throat, and her mouth wrapped around a snarl. _Sweet monster of mine_ , Laura thinks terribly when Carmilla's fingers tighten around her windpipe.

Carmilla falls back into herself after a moment, blinking, and her grip slackens.

"Laura?" she questions, her voice thick with sleep and confusion and an easy innocence on her face. It breaks Laura's heart a little. She forgets, sometimes, that Carmilla died so young and sweet. It nearly brings angered tears to her when she thinks about it, the unfairness of Carmila's face now stone and glass cracked under her mothers touch. Laura has to swallow down the rage because the world took parts of Carmilla that she never offered to give.

Carmilla says Laura's name quietly but she doesn't respond, Laura's hand finding the back of Carmilla's skull and pulling her closer. Laura's lips search hers, fingers burning across her skin and her heartbeat the only sound between the two. Laura tries to count the beating in her palms, one, two, one, two, and Carmilla licks her way across Laura's lips.

Laura breathes something nonsensical and raw when Carmilla's fingertips finds the curve of her spine beneath her top, tracing each vertebrae with a drag of nail and flesh. She opens her eyes a little, peeking at Carmilla through her lashes, and the hand wrapped around Carmilla's hip squeezes to her breathless pants.

Laura swallows then, trailing the curve of Carmilla's jeans slung low across her waist and her belly tightening under Laura's touch when she swirls her fingers against Carmilla's skin. Carmilla kisses her insistently, a hand finding the pale expanse of her neck. Something twinges in Laura, something low and deep, to the feel of Carmilla's deadly fingers across her pulsing throat.

Carmilla grunts, primal and unforgiving, when Laura flicks open the button of her jeans. Her fingers find Carmilla warm and wet. She breathes shakily into the curve of Carmilla's mouth but Carmilla pulls away with a blink after a second.

Carmilla inhales sharply when Laura's fingers twitch, hips canted a little under the touch. "Laura," she warns. The words die on her tongue though because Laura knows. She knows, and a warm bed on a warm night is not the time to paint Carmilla's sins across her skin, cold and heavy.

But Laura would gladly take the weight of them, she thinks, brushing against Carmilla slowly, her lips finding Carmilla's temple and her breath stuttering against skin. Carmilla mumbles Laura's name again, her palm around the curve of Laura's jaw, and her dry lips skimming the pulsing vein in her neck. A heavy puff of air leaves Laura when her canine nicks it, her tongue soon to follow.

Laura says her name with a rumble, " _Carmilla_ ," and exposes all.

Carmilla smiles against her skin, the reverence warm in her touch. Then her teeth sink into Laura and she feels the warm sticky blood leave her with Carmilla's greedy gulps. Laura swallows around a heavy gasp as she licks the stray beads of red with her tongue, her thumb rubs slowly along Laura's chin. Laura thinks she might be shaking when she slides two fingers into Carmilla. There is a groan against Laura's neck.

Laura fucks her quietly under the cover of darkness with a sob against her larynx and Carmilla, Carmilla, Carmilla beating through her chest. Carmilla alternates between lapping at her punctured skin and tracing the curve of Laura's neck with her tongue. Laura pants against her, warm and squirming, with blood singing in her veins and at Carmilla's teeth.

_Laura_ , Carmilla whispers, _Laura, Laura, oh god, LauraLauraLaura_. Laura feels like Carmilla is tearing her open, scratching at the walls of Laura's being with her edged kisses. Laura's heart stutters and she claws the words mine, _mine_ into Carmilla's skin.

" _Laura_ ," she says again, and Laura doesn't think she has ever heard anything quite so lovely.

 

+

 

It is four nights later, when Laura twists in her bed and sweat crawls up her neck, that Carmilla slides under her covers. Her fingers tug at the knot of Laura's pajama pants string and her lips find Laura's neck with a soft kiss rather than a tearing bite. She kisses Laura like the world might end to the sound of their heavy breathing, and hallowed words pass between.

(And Laura knows it is love when she finishes with a muffled pant against the column of Carmilla's throat. Carmilla brushes her fingers through the hair above Laura's ear and hums her affections against Laura's lips.)

 

+

 

Her father doesn't call anymore.

Laura is too tired to care.

 

+

 

The Dean comes around twice a week, taking more and more of Carmilla with her.

( _Stop, she's mine_ , Laura whispers into Carmilla's pale neck when she comes back. _Leave her alone, she's mine, she's mine, she's mine_.)

 

+

 

Carmilla wipes a dribble of blood at the corner of her lips and looks at Laura like she might disappear from sight at any moment.

Laura looks back and traces the curve of her breast. When they kiss it taste of iron and promised years unraveled around them. Laura doesn't think she'd have it any other way.

 

+

 

_Danny, Danny, Danny, oh god, Danny_ -

_Betty, Elsie, Ell, no, Danny, no_ -

Carmilla holds her until she can't cry anymore. She falls asleep, choking on light.

 

+

 

_I love you_ , she texts her father.

_I miss you_ , she texts Danny.

_I'm sorry_ , she texts Perry and LaF.

The lake swallows up her phone happily when she throws it. She doesn't dare look back.

 

+

 

"Do you still want me to get it?" Carmilla's bangs are plastered to her forehead and hands are heavy against Laura's skin when she whispers the sin into the warmth of Laura's thigh. "The sword," she clarifies quietly when Laura's lips curl around the question.

Laura freezes, her fingers stilling in Carmilla's hair.

"I'll grab it if you want me to."

Carmilla shuffles up Laura's body until she can peer down at Laura. Until Laura can't look away. "Carm, that's," Laura starts. "Your mother - "

"It's certifiable suicide and my mother will probably kill me," Carmilla says, her eyes roaming across Laura's face like she is trying to find the answer to a question Laura still doesn't know how to vocalize. _Do it. Do it now_ , Laura remembers, and clenches a fist around the wrinkled dead thing Carmilla is offering. "But if you want me to, I will."

"I can't ask you to do that,"

"You're not asking. I'm offering."

Laura pushes at Carmilla's shoulders until they are sitting. Her knees are tucked up under her and Laura shivers when she wraps the sheet around her chest. Carmilla gazes, unabashedly, and continues, "I can't promise we'll live long enough to use it. And it won't bring your friends back, but I think I might like to avenge them for your sake.

"For...my sake?" Laura asks, the words coming out strained and hard. Her stomach feels like an endless pit that swallows all her warmth.

"I'd rather not kill you too," Carmilla says, a confession.

"What?"

"Laura, you know," Carmilla says. She tears her eyes away and looks to the rumpled sheets. "I asked you to stay and that was selfish of me. But I don't regret it. Not really. I regret that I've killed so many and can't bear to think of killing you too."

"You'd never hurt me," Laura says. She lets her palm rest on the hard of Carmilla's knee, a reassurance.

Carmilla smiles ruefully. "Never. At least not intentionally. But my mother is beyond me, and she usually ends up taking everything anyways. I - I don't want to think of what she'll do to you."

"You - she hasn't done anything yet."

Carmilla's fingers twitch before forming fists. She slaps them against her thighs and sighs through her teeth. "And I've paid for that dearly."

"Carmilla?"

Laura doesn't need to ask. Somewhere deep in the dark inside of her she knows. _Monster, monster_. She knows who she means.

"What if we run?" Laura says. It is a naïve plea given life in her desperation because Laura doesn't know what else she could possibly say.

"You know that wouldn't work." Carmilla shakes her head. "I would much rather die a fool for love than a coward hiding away in some cheap motel. And if I know you at all, Laura Hollis, you wouldn't go down that way either."

Laura lets herself smile.

"Is that why you are doing this? Because you'd rather go out fighting?"

"No. You know why I'm doing it."

"I want you to say it."

Laura tugs at one of Carmilla's fists, uncurling her fingers and pressing them to her chest. Carmilla doesn't watch the action, looking to Laura's face instead. Laura looks back, afraid to blink. "Laura - "

"Please," Laura sighs, her heart beating at Carmilla's fingertips. It is hers, completely, if Carmilla wants it. Laura would carve it from her chest if Carmilla asked, heavy and filled with her love. It would be simple and human, but Laura would gladly give it away if Carmilla only asked.

"Because I love you," Carmilla confesses with a tremble. "Is that what you want to hear?"

Yes. _Yes_. Laura kisses her until she can't breathe.

 

+

 

Carmilla doesn't say much as she dries off. The bathroom is steamed from their shower and Laura's feet slip along the wet tiles while she runs a towel through her hair. Carmilla touches the skin of Laura's hip lightly when she leans to grab her toothbrush, her thumb reassuringly tracing a constellation of freckles.

Laura can imagine the ritual a thousand fold in another lifetime. And when she does, her heart aches with a longing for that version of herself who does not know what she has. It with a surprising clarity that she can mourn for that Laura, for what she never lost and never had to endure.

She tucks the towel under her arms and stops when Carmilla spits toothpaste from her mouth.

Laura doesn't need to imagine that foreign Carmilla.

"I," Laura swallows once, her fingers finding Carmilla's collarbone. She traces the shape as her eyes flicker to Carmilla's face. "I don't know what to say."

"Thank you would be a good place to start," Carmilla says. Her mouth quirks, a smile, and her hands find Laura's hips beneath the wet towel.

A sharp laugh, and Laura says, "Thank you."

Laura continues her path across Carmilla's skin, letting her fingers trace the curve of Carmilla's neck, the jut of jaw, the red in her cheeks. Laura does not dare look away, afraid of Carmilla's face dulled under her fragile human memories. Carmilla lets Laura wipe the droplets from her forehead and brow, and lets her tangle hands in the damp locks that frame Carmilla's face. _Live for me_ , Laura does not say because she couldn't bear for Carmilla to leave it unfulfilled.

_Live for me and I'll live for you_.

"I love you," is all Laura says instead, because her heart is filled with Carmilla and her bones are carved sharp with the unspoken promise. Her throat catches and she has to swallow down the press of emotion rising in her. "I love you," she repeats, firmer, because it's the only thing she is sure of anymore.

"I know."

Her eyes burn with tears and she doesn't want to look away.

"You're mine," Laura says and kisses her. She imagines she can taste the disaster and wretched heartache on Carmilla's tongue, imagines it filling her until it bursts from Laura's chest and paints the both of them. Laura can feel the sting of blood from Carmilla's mouth and her bad arm aches when she presses her fingers to Carmilla's neck. She doesn't wince - it reminds her of the world waiting to swallow the both of them up.

"Come back," Laura finally says, a heavy demand. "I won't let you leave without me."

Carmilla smiles and it steals the breath from her.

"Of course," Carmilla whispers, the words sacred in Laura's mouth.

Laura close her eyes and imagines the sword burning from the inside out.

 

 +

 

_Live for me and I'll live for you_.

Laura smiles, bloody.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for motivating me to finish. And thank you for reading!!

**Author's Note:**

> Main and chapter titles come from [Shallow Play](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VuHUUKotwpY) by The New Division. Unbeta'd as usual.
> 
> I'm on [tumblr](http://catcarmilla.tumblr.com/) btw, so yell at me to finish this fic.


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